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<h3>2870 — The day of Dhekhnam</h3>
<h4>Terror in the east</h4>
For over twelve hundred years Munkhâsh has been a tale from history books. The Caďinorian peoples still shudder at the memory of the Occupation; but Munkhâsh had been utterly defeated, and <b><i>ktuvok</b></i> was now only a word for demon. How is it, then, that something very much like Munkhâsh has suddenly appeared just east of Eretald?
<p>The <b>Dhekhnami</b> were known for being unscrupulous traders, and disrespectful of borders. Still, the <a href="Javascript:parent.al('Sarn%C3%A1e');">Sarnáeans</a> felt safe enough to indulge itself in a feudal squabble: the lords of the south complained of neglect and exploitation, and when one of their least favorite opponents, Caolonawe, was chosen as King (<i>daolo</i>) of <b>Sarnáe</b>, they declared themselves independent as Iosoandor (‘upper Shkónoro’, 2820). Caolonawe was willing to talk; but when he learned that topic the southerners wished to put on the table was his abdication, he declared war instead.
<p>By the standards of Eretald the war was rather old-fashioned: armies of no more than 12,000 engaging in formal battles during the day, feasting together at night. In 2822 Dhekhnam announced its support for the southerners, and invaded in force, with perhaps 90,000 men and ktuvoks. A third of Sarnáe was brutally occupied; the northern army was massacred; Caolonawe’s head was fed to dogs.
<p>The campaign for <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al('Carhinnoi');">Carhinnia</a></b> was no less ferocious, but more difficult; the Carhinnoi, even in decline, were formidable fighters. Indeed, the Carhinnoi at first scorned their enemies as cowards, because they preferred killing horses to killing men. Their disdain soon turned to dismay: horses were their wealth and their military transport, and they were being slaughtered by the thousands. By the time the war proper started, Carhinnoi were already dying of malnutrition. Still, it took ten years (2835-45) before they were entirely reduced.
<p>The Carhinnoi were allowed to keep their religion, Jippirasti, and were welcomed into the Dhekhnami army; in later wars they formed the Dhekhnami cavalry. The subjugated Sarnáeans were less fortunate; their position in the new empire was that of slaves.
<h4>Elsewhere in Eretald</h4>
The Caďinorians did have some excuse for its inattention to the affairs of the east: <b>Caďinas was no more</b>. The last of the Empire was conquered by the Curiyan king Meugi in 2792. There was something anticlimactic about this end. <a href="Javascript:parent.al('Curiya');">Curiya</a> was no wild horde, but a settled state, and not a large one. The Ctesifonei themselves were benumbed, but their suffering was not excessive. Meugi and his barons appropriated some lands and palaces for themselves, but confirmed most of the nobles in their positions. The greatest hurt was to the city’s pride: once the center of the universe, Ctesifon was now ruled from an adobe shambles (Kulža) by the spawn of barbarians.
<p>(The Curiyan rulers were descended from the Coruo, and still spoke their own language among themselves, but had long ago learned to speak to their peasant subjects in a Caďinorian dialect. Like everyone else in Eretald they called it <i>soa Sfahe; </i>we call it the Curiyan dialect of Verdurian.)
<p>More important for Eretald as a whole was the invasion of the <b>Makši</b>, a branch of the southern (Naviu) barbarians. They defeated their rivals the Eluyet (2820), conquered Aránicer (around 2830), then spilled explosively onto southeastern Eretald (2850). This was the last great barbarian invasion of the Plain, and is still commonly blamed for the relative poverty of the south.
<p>The <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al(
'Elenicoi');">Elenicoi</a></b> arrived in <b>Avéla</b> in 2780, bringing news of redemption. The starting point of their voyage was on our planet— the Greeks left Arsinoe, Egypt, on a trading expedition, in AD 325; their preternatural transportation of their vessel to Almea is known as the Miracle of the Translation, and their doctrine would develop into the Avélan Catholic Church (<i>Aďeton Naurondise i Avéla</i>).
<p>The local people, burdened by the rule of Kebri, were as thirsty for political as for spiritual redemption. The Elenico leader, Mihel, quickly grasped the situation, and found himself organizing both a spiritual awakening and an underground uprising. The Kebreni execution of Mihel only created a martyr (2820). The rebellion intensified, and Avéla was free by 2840.
<p>The marriage of Anabar, lord of <b>Verduria</b>, with Ašeli, princess of Zeir, approximately doubled the size of the Verdurian lands (2870).
<p>The <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al('Barakh%C3%BAn');">Barakhinei</a></b> chieftains appear for the first time on this map. Their tough warriors had long stiffened the Caďinorian resistance to the barbarians; now they were freed to act on their own behalf. They had already pushed the Somoyi back over the mountains.
<p>The border between the Suböyi and Westerners has been moving back and forth, as pastoral and agricultural techniques spread to the savanna dwellers, increasing their density and thus their ability to fight back. There was a good deal of mixing and multilingualism on the tribal level.
<p>Köüdɔi, the warlord of Laidöü succeeded in restoring the unity of <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al('Nan');">Nan</a></b>, around 2800. He did not bother to depose the kings of o-Dayevu, though he did relocated them to the town of o-Seyino where they could be more easily watched. At about the same time, ships from Kebri reached Nan, reestablishing regular north-south trade. The locals were overawed by the advancement of the southerners, but fortunately they had a new export the Kebreni couldn't get enough of: <b>coffee</b>.
<h4>Agricultural revolution</h4>
An agricultural revolution was underway in Eretald, fostered by four inventions, only one of which was recent and local:
<ul><li>The switch from the two-field to the three-field system
<li>The spread of water mills. In Zeir alone, there were 4 mills in 2700, and 200 two centuries later
<li>The adoption of the horse collar, invented by the Coruo, which increased the amount horses could comfortably pull by tenfold and allowed the faster horse to be used for plowing
<li>The introduction of the heavy plow (originally developed in Xengiman)
</ul>
Before these improvements, a measure of seed yielded only a 50% surplus; farmers lived precariously (even without the threat of pillaging nomads) and were easily devastated by drought or plague. Now the surplus was 300% or more. Farmers became more secure and more numerous. Life still seemed precarious, but things were looking up.
<h4>In the south</h4>
In the south, the <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al('Sainor');">Sainor</a></b>, crowded and compressed after being expelled from Xurno, invaded Skouras (2790-95). They did not find this fruit easy to grasp. The Jippirasti Tžuro were outraged to be ruled by pagans, and their prowess at war was considerable. They launched one insurrection after another. The Sainor had to resort to terror to put them down: when a town rebelled, they killed half its menfolk and scattered the remainder to other cities. This policy succeeded, in the sense of forcing the Tžuro to rethink their strategy.
<p><b>Xurno</b> was suffering from a series of weak <i>nyew</i>; and when the <i>nyei</i> is weak, the highly centralized Xurnese state was virtually paralyzed. The peripheral provinces— Xazno, Bolon, and the Čiqay— have drifted into independence, Seia were invading in the west, and the Čeiyu have successfully rebelled (by 2840). The Cuolese, modern descendents of ancient Puroneli, established their kingdom in 2857, under Sucunto, lord of Yewör.
<p>Power in <b><a href="Javascript:parent.al('%C4%8Ceiy');">Čeiy</a></b> (natively <i>Ṭeô</i>) was, in theory, shared between the reconstituted Senate and the large landowners. In practice the Master of Šušumbör wielded enormous influence on the country. The Bezuxau network was instrumental in the fight for independence; the Master could easily have made himself into a monarch. However, he found a backstage role to be altogether more pleasant: he was not bothered by administrative trivia, while his effective power— insinuated by hints, but enforced by violence— was supreme.
<p>Čeiy had done most of the work expelling the Xurnese from the Mnau peninsula; but local groups of <b>Skourenes</b> fought as well. When the war was over there were three rival states in the liberated territories, each claiming paramount leadership over the others: Luṭay, Muranal, and the Uṭandal League.
<p>(<i>Ḍaš Uṭandal</i> means ‘The League of the Strong’ in the Barmundi dialect. <i>Uṭandal </i>was used as an alternative to <i>Skurendi</i> ‘Skourenes’ as early as 2600. Both terms are still used, but outsiders, who are unmoved by the claim to Skouras, prefer the former term.)
<p>The Gelihur peninsula was united under the control of Kulapman, which sent envoys to congratulate the rivals on their independence, and to dissuade them from thoughts of recreating the Čisran Empire. The language of the peninsula is by now quite different from that of Mnau: the envoys had to speak through interpreters.
<p><b>Gurdago</b> is steadily expanding its empire over the Kra valley. The highlands remain a forbidding environment which both Čia and Gurdagor are happy to leave to the Gunik.
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